


the morning light as magic

by lost_decade



Category: Formula E RPF
Genre: Confessions, M/M, Pillow Talk, Sleepless nights, mentions of past dan/jev
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-14
Updated: 2018-07-14
Packaged: 2019-06-10 07:03:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,700
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15286287
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lost_decade/pseuds/lost_decade
Summary: Gradually André had started spending so much time in Jean-Éric’s hotel rooms that he’d taken to just unpacking in there, their clothes together in the wardrobe and toothbrushes side by side on the sink in some transient image of a relationship that existed on only a dozen weekends of the year.





	the morning light as magic

**Author's Note:**

> Set on the Friday night of the NYC EPrix weekend.
> 
> Title from a [Robert Montgomery poem/billboard.](http://www.robertmontgomery.org/new-gallery/6skew906y4pq9yl6bvhorxcfdsahka)

3AM thoughts are never entirely rational, Jean-Éric knows this and yet it still doesn’t help, the tumble of shit going round in his head not exactly easing him into the rest he knows he needs to get before the race tomorrow.

He fidgets, turning over and kicking off the sheets to let the cool air wash over his skin, the whole summer stretching out before him, all the days that will come after Sunday – and it isn’t honestly that long. It’s almost embarrassing really, when Jean-Éric thinks about it objectively. He’s not a teenager in love for the first time anymore, unable to go more than a couple of days without hearing Dan’s voice.

It is after all only a few weeks until Silverstone and of course it’s not the same, being on different teams, he can’t fall asleep in the back of the same garage as André, arms casually around each other and the scent of André’s skin, his aftershave filling Jean-Éric’s senses until he associates that smell with comfort, with sleep, with _home_. But they will see each other and it’ll be fine, it’ll be just like it always is when they’re together, they’ll hang out with their mutual friends and André will barbecue, Jev himself will make some joke about them being in some sort of domestic bliss and at the end of the night he’ll come with André’s hand over his mouth because there’ll be someone else in the room next door and they’ll need to be quiet.

He shifts again, turning over so that he’s facing the window instead of André, sleep seeming like an increasingly distant prospect. The issue here is that he’s brought this on almost entirely by himself and he’d thought he had more control of his emotions than to let that happen – it had seemed fun in the beginning, having a teammate that he just clicked with so unbelievably well, exciting to play up their friendship with a bit of flirting. He’s not sure where it started to get fucked up in his head, to mean more, probably when the team jumped on it too – it’s not as though Jean-Éric actually needed anyone to coin a hashtag to demonstrate that there might be something between him and André and now he half wishes he hadn’t run with it so wholeheartedly.

The problem is that André has also taken it on board and how’s Jean-Éric to know how he really feels about it?

That’s the issue really, that underneath everything, Jev doesn’t have a clue how André feels about anything. He knows which of André’s cars is his favourite, which restaurants he likes best in half a dozen cities around the world, he knows the bitten off sounds he makes when he comes and the way he takes his coffee. It’s the fact that Jean-Éric knows virtually nothing of André’s past, of any lovers, any heartbreak, it’s how Jean-Éric himself can’t seem to refrain from verbal diarrhoea on the subject of his own ill-fated romances. Hiding his feelings has never been a strong point and he’s sure that André must be aware how, for him this is more than a casual teammates with benefits scenario.

“I can hear you thinking,” André says sleepily, interrupting the turbulence of Jean-Éric’s thoughts.

“You want me to go back to my own room? Championships aren’t won on no sleep.”

“Stay,” Jean-Éric replies, his hand finding André’s beneath the sheet and giving it a little squeeze. “I wasn’t thinking about the Championship anyway.”

“I don’t think there’s anything else that should be keeping you awake tonight, unless you’re trying to decide which city we should open our sunglasses store in, which obviously is very important,” André teases, letting go of Jean-Éric’s hand and running a fingertip lightly up his side, skimming all his ticklish spots. “Seriously, get some rest,” he yawns, the two of them falling silent for a few minutes then.

Jean-Éric closes his eyes against the bright lights of Manhattan creeping in through the gap in the curtains from across the East River, trying to settle and share in the peaceful relaxation he can feel from André’s body beside him. It’s impossible, and now that André’s mentioned the Championship he can’t help but start thinking about that either, visualising the track in his mind, running through each turn and all the days of sim prep before getting pissed off at himself because thinking is pointless and he’s eager to just get out there and win it - hopefully with André up there beside him.

“Do you have plans for the summer?” Jean-Éric asks tentatively, feeling André jolt beside him, pulled back from the sleep he was drifting into.

“I mean, we can catch up at Silverstone, but I was just thinking before that we could...if maybe you were in London, then I--”

“I was thinking about going back to Japan for a couple weeks,” André cuts him off, Jean-Éric thankful for the interruption given how embarrassingly what he was trying to say was going.

“Oh,” is pathetically all that Jean-Éric can put together in response, half wishing that he’d left his teammate to sleep rather than delving around in this the night before a title deciding race weekend, something sharp and painful gathering in his chest, a storm about to break. He’s sure that André can hear it in his tone. Sometimes it feels like the German - German, Belgian, a little Peruvian and a flavour of Japan, a man of anywhere and everywhere, impossible to pin down, Jev thinks - can read him too well, it seems almost unreal, how someone you’ve never met can walk into your life and know you almost instantly the way André did. It makes Jean-Éric feel incredibly special and horribly vulnerable all at the same time. “That sounds cool. I thought I might visit Léa, or--”

“I want to take you to Tokyo,” André interrupts him again, turning so they're facing each other, sliding one of his legs between Jean-Éric’s and nuzzling his nose against his face, capturing his lips in a brief kiss. “I want you to see all the places I love, want you to meet my friends. I'm gonna get you drunk on Yamazaki and carry you home, fuck you all night, take you apart.”

Jean-Éric bites his lip, shocked, looking into André’s eyes in the shadowy light of the hotel room, gasping a little as André brings a hand up to stroke the side of his face, fingers sliding back into his hair.

“You mean that?” he asks.

André smiles, pressing his lips to Jean-Éric’s. “Do you want that,” he asks.

Jean-Éric closes his eyes for a moment, knowing that he should probably choose his words carefully. It’s difficult to not tell the truth when you’re naked and in the arms of someone you’ve accidentally fallen in love with.

“Yeah I think that sounds nice, but you don’t have to get me drunk to fuck me, not anymore,” he jokes, half-referencing how their encounters in the early part of the season had been just that - intoxicated fucking at after-parties that they never really talked about the next day aside from lewd innuendo about how much fun it’d been. Gradually André had started spending so much time in Jean-Éric’s hotel rooms that he’d taken to just unpacking in there, their clothes together in the wardrobe and toothbrushes side by side on the sink in some transient image of a relationship that existed on only a dozen weekends of the year.

“I want it,” André admits, “you. I think I did after about a week of knowing you.”

It’s as bold a confession as André has ever made about what it is that they’re doing here, and Jean-Éric thinks he sees a flicker of unknown vulnerability in André’s eyes for a second. He needs more and it panics him that he doesn’t have it yet, that there’s so much he still doesn’t know. He’d known everything about Daniel, the Australian an open book that was easy to get lost in the pages of, until he was so lost that he couldn’t remember what it was about himself that had made Dan love him in the first place, until there was nothing good about him left. That’s what Marko had thought and Jean-Éric remembers with crushing clarity that one moment when he saw it reflected in Dan’s eyes, when he’d known that Dan had chosen racing over him. Not that he blames Dan, not anymore. He’d probably have done the same when it came down to it.

“It was in Marrakech for me,” Jean-Éric replies honestly, “the day we got lost in the medina.”

“It was a good day,” André says, kissing him slowly, moving so he’s half lying on top of Jean-Éric as their tongues slide together languidly, Jean-Éric’s hands on André’s back, fingertips tracing every bump of his spine.

“I’m bad at _I love yous,_ ” André confesses, lips warm against Jean-Éric’s cheek, cool from the air con.

“It’s okay,” Jean-Éric tells him softly, “but you know that I’m French and we’re quite big on romance so don’t be surprised if I get you a new addition to your garage for your birthday or something.” It’s easier to joke than to push, even if the real question he wants to ask is _why, did someone hurt you?_

“If you’re aiming to make me cry like Léa did then please don’t film it,” André laughs, shifting his weight off Jean-Éric and turning to lie on his back, taking his teammate’ hand and linking their fingers together.

“Tokyo, then...” Jean-Éric muses. The last time he was in Japan back in 2014 he’d felt the lowest he’d ever been in his life. The thought of going back there with André, getting to see into his past, it feels like a leap Jean-Éric is ready to take.

“Next weekend. I’ll even let you pick the movies on the flight,” André replies. “Can we please sleep now, you’re not the only one with a race to do tomorrow.”

“We can sleep,” Jean-Éric replies, rubbing his thumb over the back of André’s hand, feeling immensely sleepier and more relaxed than he has all day.


End file.
